Open Cities launches Open Data Tourism Hack-at-Home app challenge

News from May 24, 2013

Open Cities has just launched a new call-out to take part in the Open Data Tourism Hack at Home challenge, a project focused on encouraging the creation of mobile apps to help cities to better manage the challenges and benefits of tourism.

The challenge, focused on the user of Open Data and Open Sensor Networks, will allow numerous European cities, to benefit from the talents of app creators to find solutions for managing tourism in the urban space by developing apps that can minimize the impact of mass tourism on the city and its inhabitants. The Open Data Tourism Hack at Home is looking for mobile technology solutions that will allow residents to connect with visitors, improve and personalize tourist itineraries, optimize the time for visits and improve the opportunities for tourists to move around the city during their stay.

The winning app will receive a 3.000€ prize and a nomination for the Mobile Premier Awards, the most prestigious awards in the app industry. By participating in the Open Data Tourism Hack at Home challenge, developers will have the opportunity to turn their ideas into working apps through the Hack at Home platform, which allows participants to present their ideas, form teams with like-minded designers, developers and coders and get the help of expert mentors to build apps for the participating cities.

From today, anyone interested in taking part in the challenge can pre-register at the Open Data Tourism Hack at Home challenge website. From May 13, participants can send their ideas for apps, start building teams and receive feedback from the mentors in preparation for the awards ceremony on November 19, 2013. Additionally, Open Cities has also launched in parallel a call for larger solutions, services or technologies related to the same Tourism issues, to participate to its Urban Lab Challenge.